Cover letter help\advice

[silver.fox.2008]

Hi,

After some help with writing a cover letter for a prospective job.

Does anyone have an examples\advice they can offer for wording cover letters

Nore sure if I need to be very specific or bullet point key achievements

If anyone's got examples of any, that would be much appreciated

Thanks all

[Ray Luxury-Yacht]

Hiya,

For what it's worth, I've worked both in recruitment, and various senior management roles that involved advertising for and recruiting staff.

My tips:

Admittedly most of my recruitment was in the printing industry, so one of the initial 'straight to bin' sorting techniques was anything with poor grammar, spelling and wording. Possibly not as important for other jobs, but even so, I maintain that if someone can't send a CV and cover letter that's reasonably professionally done, without errors, then that person hasn't really given a fk about the application.

Secondly - you can immediately tell if someone has sent the same cover letter to loads of companies without changing it to suit. Hah, I've even received cover letters with the name of a rival company on it before, where they haven't even managed to change the name before sending a copy to me!

Recruiters and managers always want to see that you've done a bit of research on your prospective employer first, and that should be reflected in the letter.

So, do some research (easy on the internet - the company's website, products etc. - or even call them as a prospective customer, and ask about the products or whatever - and get a brochure sent of possible) and relate that in your letter. So, if company 'A' that you're looking at specialises in, I dunno, pink widgets, in your cover letter should be something thus: 'when I worked at Attic widgets, one of the things I specialised in and enjoyed getting involved in was pink widgets. I worked on a pink widget launch that involved x, y and z, and I learned a, b and c from doing that. As you are one of the most prolific and experienced companies in pink widgets, I can be an excellent asset to you thus...' etc.

Always do your research on the company, and tailor your letter to match your key skills to their specialities. I guarantee you'll get an interview that way, if you do it right.

And don't forget to do a spelling and grammar check!

Good luck, and let us know how you get on. By all means PM me and I'll be happy to try to help some more if I can.

[rog007]

Some sound advice there from the Yachtmeister. I would add that a covering letter is a mini interview (that's how I approach them). Imagine your CV as the standing statement of your competencies and impact, then the covering letter is the pre-interview, bringing that CV to life and adding a bit more specificity to its applicability to the organisation you're applying to; if they like what they read, they will want to call you back to hear more (the full interview). I would also add: be brief (they may have a lot of covering letters to read so no waffling); be succinct (ditto); and most importantly, state why they must call you forward or an interview (if you can't do this with confidence and in a couple of sentences at most, then you may already be out of the race). Good luck!

[Mr Snap]

rog007 said:

...... adding a bit more specificity to its applicability to the organisation you're applying to...

Next!